So after living and working on, in and around the west coast (fort bill and glencoe mostly) for the best part of the last 4 years,I have rarely ventured further east than the northern corries. This is largely due to munro bagging being knocked down the list for personal leisure time by climbing and mountaineering both summer and winter.

Yesterday I went hill walking again. I Decided to go into Glen Clova and nip round Mayar and Dreish. An area i have never been or explored. I was genuinely amazed at how well this area has been set up for walking, tourism and your weekend walkers and wanderers who surely wouldn't venture onto the plateau...? But you'll never guess what...

I saw countless numbers of people who fortunately will have got away with it this time but probably shouldn't have been up therebecause in my personal opinion they a) have no idea what there doing up there b) aren't prepared appropriately to be up there c) most of all they put others in a position due to there lack of knowledge, preparation, and the attitude of if it goes wrong we can just call MR. (which is completely wrong but a worryingly majority of people i came into contact with had this attitude)

Now i have become very good at blanking out and ignoring the hoards of contenders for the Darwin awards on the ben nevis path due to repeated ascents but i was very surprised and concerned at the numbers who were so obviously under prepared and felt almost uncomfortable in there presence.

My thoughts and opinions on this can be seen as controversial as I have and do make a living from the mountain environment. I am not trying to be above my station or gain from this. I was just interested because yesterday in Stirling there was the McofS mountain safety day.http://www.mcofs.org.uk/news.asp?s=2&id=MCS-N11496&nc=Mountain%20Safety Did any one on here attend?

Does anyone else feel concerned when people present themselves under prepared, and obviously lost, not sure or just plain daft?

Brian Howarth

Re: A real eye opener.

15 Oct 2014

Yesterday on Ben Nevis about 900m at 15:30 on our way down, we passed an Italian couple on their way up. They asked us if it was about 45 minutes to the top. I told them more like an hour and a half! We warned them it would be dark at 18:30. They didn't have any torches. The woman was dressed appropriately, but the guy was wearing a cotton hoodie, jogging bottoms and trainers. It was below freezing at the summit and quite a brisk wind, but otherwise clear. He looked cold at 900m and I told him it was Baltic at the top... perhaps this lost something in the translation. Once they left us, my wife heard the guy said they would start heading down if it started to get dark. No idea when, or if, they made it down. It was dark when we got down, so guessing they had to stumble of in the dark. Only on the honeypot mountains have I ever seen this stuff (that included a girl in bikini top and flip flops on Ben Lomond).

ps the guy did thank us for our advice, even though he chose to ignore it, which was polite.

pps well done to my wife Jane who made it with two knee replacements. This was her third Munro with two new knees. We had been building up to this after the WHW and trips to Beinn Dearg (Atholl), The Cobbler and Ben Lomond. The descent included a stumble where she broke her walking pole, but she made it up and down.

Gareth Lynn

Re: A real eye opener.

17 Nov 2014

I used to look down my nose at people with less experience than me,
until one day I realised I was being a bit of a knob. ;-)